


we come alive in the evening

by alittlelove



Category: Shameless (US)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Character Study, Drabble, Established Relationship, Fluff, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, M/M, Mexico, imagine if ian had gone with mick 7x11
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-27
Updated: 2019-05-27
Packaged: 2020-03-20 06:00:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 928
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18986698
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alittlelove/pseuds/alittlelove
Summary: They knew what they liked; loved, even. Ian knew he loved Mickey and he didn’t really know much else.





	we come alive in the evening

**Author's Note:**

> enjoy! this took me all of 20 minutes to write lol. i imaged if ian had gone with mick to mexico, and here is what i came up with...

_Quiero estar contigo para siempre._

 

He was one with the waves as they crashed on the shore. One with the sand as he brushed it off the arches of his feet. One with the land, one with the people. One with the sky as blue as his own eyes and one with the nature.

He didn’t belong where he landed. Maybe he’d spent many-a-day there as a child but now he belongs here. The sun on his skin and the tequila on his tongue. His fingertips dancing against others with an ease only freedom can bring. The patterns the moon had painted in his eyes, on his skin. Maybe it wasn’t his intent to end up here, but he did, and reality could warp him all it could, but it couldn’t change him.

Sometimes he catches Ian’s eye and his expression sinks. He never cries, but his knuckles scream _FUCK U-UP_ in Ian’s face as he rubs his sky eyes raw with the heels of his hands. The only thing close to confrontation Mickey offers him is a kiss on the neck and a “I’m happy, aren’t you?”

And sometimes, when Ian closes his eyes instead of staring at the blank ceiling above their heads, he can see out the window adjacent to his single bed in Chicago. He sees Fiona, Carl, Lip and Debbie and sometimes even Frank or Monica. The imperfectness of their lives, but the abundance of love. Sometimes it would overflow the walls in that house so much that Ian would force himself to leave for a couple of hours so that the love wouldn't overflow inside his own heart.

Maybe leaving for a couple of hours is what he’d intended to do when he’d thrown his rucksack into the passenger seat of that car. All of his intentions had been thrown away when he’d seen the raw need in Mickey. It was the only push he’d ever required to come with him. And it’s the only thing that he still needs to force himself to stay.

One night in December, they were sleeping on a mattress the floor of one of Ian’s co-workers at the second minimum-wage gig he’d landed's apartments. He’d buried his face into the scent of Mickey’s neck to avoid the stinging sensation on the rims of his eyes and clutched Mickey's palms so hard he was scared he’d leave marks. They were so far from where Ian called home that home had become a person instead of a place and Mickey was the only place he felt safe anymore.

“You alright?” Mickey had asked, not even a whisper.

“Mm,” he hummed, swallowing anything he may have said to remark his own actions. _This isn’t where we belong. We deserve so much better than this, fuck! Why can’t you see that?_

And maybe there were days that Mexico looked like all that they deserved. When Mickey tossed the baggies and pills into his nightstand drawers and let Ian pull him in close. When the cold saltiness of the ocean tickled their ankles and they splashed each other in the face. When Mickey’s smile reached his eyes and Ian knew that his did too. When the sun bit at Mickey’s porcelain skin and he winced at the feel of Ian’s palms on his sunburnt shoulders the next day. When it was way past dark and all Ian could comprehend past the stars exploding behind his eyelids was the taste of Mickey on his tongue and lack of air in his lungs. When the high they got off each other was almost as good as the one from the bud Mickey carried in such a surplus.

“Nobody gives a fuck what I do around here, man,” The smoke escaping his lips had curled around Mickey’s words. “I told you it’d be a vacation.”

Maybe Ian didn’t want to admit to it, but it felt like that at times. A vacation. A vacation laced with fear, weighted with worry and paranoia, but a vacation nonetheless. Anything he did with Mickey was an adventure. Not a psycho-thriller, as Fiona had lied, but an adventure.

“Whatever you say,” Ian had flashed his eyes to the moths swirling around the lamp to the side of their mattress. They then traced to where his own hand was reaching out to the cigarette between Mickey’s fingers, brushing them as he pulled it from his loose grip. His eyes then drew to Mickey’s knowing smirk, one he’d been victim of too many times.

Mickey’s eyes had dashed around Ian’s face in search for anything that could’ve contradicted his words as he spoke, “it’s working out so far, so good, huh? We’re happy?”

The smoke blew from Ian’s lips with the breeze as he nodded silently, happy to resolve with silence.

They were happy. They weren’t where they deserved to be.

Ian knew Mickey could feel the wetness seeping onto his cheeks as Ian had threaded his fingers into his hair and tugged him in. It wasn’t rough nor sensitive. It was tender in the way that Ian let go of his inhibitions and leaned into his intuition. The way their lips would move, their tongues would tangle, was given in to and blamed on basic human fucking instinct. It wasn’t something that Ian knew either of them could control. They knew what they liked; loved, even. Ian knew he loved Mickey and he didn’t really know much else.

And maybe that’s all they needed.

 _Quiero estar contigo para siempre,_ Ian would think- as much as he felt he shouldn’t.

 

**Author's Note:**

> please please leave kudos & comment if you can! it's my first time publishing a gallavich piece so i hope it's alright!
> 
> maybe i'll publish something else soon while i sit on my sorry ass waiting for s10
> 
> xx


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